Top 5 Fictional Tyrannosaurs

First and foremost, this article’s title contains the word ‘Tyrannosaurs’ as I cannot, for the life of me, figure out what the plural of Tyrannosaurus is. Tyrannosauruses? Tyrannosauri? As an aside, it is worth noting that there is no official terminology for when tyrannosaurs gather in groups. Everything from ‘pack’ to ‘clan’ to ‘pride’ has been suggested at one point or another. Personally, I feel the term ‘murder’ is the most appropriate.

In any case, there have been some pretty badass tyrannosaurs featured in popular culture over the ages. Here are, in my opinion (and therefore the best opinion going), five of the best.

5. The Isla Nublar T. rex – Jurassic Park/World

If there is one certainty in this vague universe of ours, it is that no list about dinosaurs would be complete without at least one Jurassic Park reference. Over the course of the series, we’ve had at least four tyrannosaurs to choose from. In this case, the original turns out to be the best. During her brief rampage in the first Jurassic Park film, the Tyrannosaurus of Isla Nublar (or ‘Rexy’ as the fans like to call her) managed to take out two raptors, a Gallimimus, a goat and a man who was sitting on the toilet, proving that variety is indeed the spice of life. What does a T. rex eat? Whatever she damn well wants apparently!

So popular was the tyrant lizard queen of Isla Nublar that she was brought back to participate in the frenzied melee that was the finalé of Jurassic World. Sure she needed some help from an anthropomorphised raptor named Blue and an oversized mosasaur, but a win is a win!

4. Sharptooth

The Jurassic Park tyrannosaurs were, as it turns out, clones of the original, made in part from frog DNA, so if anything they were a slightly watered down version of what a T. rex was really all about. To get a proper taste of what psychotically powerful monsters terrorised the world millions of years ago, we need to look no further than another Spielberg produced dino-fest, The Land Before Time. While there have been over a dozen TLBT movies, each with a selection of prehistoric predators, the original proves to be the best. None could ever match the ferocity, the terror… the one they call ‘Sharptooth’.

Did you see that? He totally just went mono-a-mono with a massive sauropod (those things were bigger than most houses!), bashed his head through solid rock because he was a bit frustrated and got blasted by super hot molten lava direct from the Earth’s core. Did it even slow him down? Heck no! He just kept on going until he got knocked into a chasm and fell thousands of feet downward to what would have spelled certain doom to lesser creatures. Even this wasn’t enough to stop him for long. He got back up soon after with little more than a mild hangover and a massive proverbial chip on his shoulder.

Now, that’s power you can’t buy!

3. Thunder

How do you improve the perfect killing machine? Two words: ‘Cybernetic Enhancements’. The makers of the first Turok game on the N64 decided they needed a super powerful boss for you to fight – one that’d make you crap your undies. They called it ‘Thunder’, a mighty T. rex which, in addition to doing the usual T. rex things like tearing through flesh and bone with equal ease, could breathe fire and shoot fricking laser beams from its fricking head! To make matters worse, it had a nasty habit of getting faster and faster based on how much damage you inflicted upon it, meaning you never really had it pinned down properly until the bitter end.

Thunder also wore steel capped boots and had a Stegosaurus‘ tail spikes for some reason. “The spikes I get, but what need would a dinosaur have for steel capped boots?”, I hear you ask. I would have tried to find out back in the day, but I was too busy running backwards and strafing!

2. Megatron – Tranformers: Beast Wars

Forget the illiterate bozo they call Grimlock. There is only one transforming Tyrannosaurus rex you need to know and his name is Megatron. How’s this for a plan? You steal the name of the most (in)famous robotic villain there is, travel back in time, assassinate Optimus Prime and attempt to wipe out humankind before it has a chance to evolve properly – all while taking on the form of a Tyrannosaurus rex (if T. rex ruled the world previously, it is only fitting that the new king should look similar) sporting the very same colour scheme as Barney the Dinosaur. The guy must have balls of adamantium!

The best part is that Beast Wars Megatron actually was successful. No other Megatron ever managed to completely conquer the planet of Cybertron (home world of the Transformers) and turn it into a totalitarian police state that George Orwell would have been proud of. He even killed Soundwave in the process (because music would obviously be banned in such a place). All of which was accomplished with a smug sense of aristocratic grandeur. Speaking of tyrannosaurid aristocratic grandeur, that brings us on to our final entry:

1. Marvel’s Devil Dinosaur

The ’70s must have been an interesting time to collect and read comic books. Back then, the idea of a little cave-man named Moon-Boy teaming up with a massive red tyrannosaur and decimating a population of cave dwelling sub-humans seemed perfectly normal. Devil Dinosaur is one Marvel character who is quite unlikely to be seen joining The Avengers anytime soon, but nonetheless, he has been doing the rounds for a few decades now, sometimes as a hero, sometimes as a bad guy. When you hang out in a comic book company’s 7th tier you are essentially a mercenary to whatever writer is kind enough to remember you. To that end, Devil Dinosaur has had some downright crazy adventures.

Between fighting the Hulk and teaming up with Godzilla, DD has a pretty impressive comic book CV. Perhaps his greatest re-imagining came in Marvel’s reasonably successful Nextwave series, where he is revealed as a tyrannical (it’s great to finally be able to use that word whilst describing a tyrannosaur) Illuminati-esque leader. Free from the constraints of his friendship with Moon-Boy (“Moon-Boy had to die. Moon-Boy tasted bad and gave me considerable rectal distress.” – DD), Devil Dinosaur could become the monster he was born (hatched?) to be…

“And a sharply dressed one at that!”

And the Worst: Theodore Rex

Sadly, simply being a tyrannosaur does not give you de facto access to being awesome. This sad truth was brought to life in the 1995 ‘comedy’ film Theodore Rex, where Whoopi Goldberg teamed up with a wisecracking T. rex-human hybrid in an attempt to fight crime. Ironically, in doing so, they managed to commit the greatest crime of all – a crime against cinema!

So poorly received was Theodore Rex by test audiences that it was pulled from New Line Cinema’s cinematic release schedule, a damning indication of quality when you consider that Waterworld, Showgirls and Batman Forever all made it into the cinemas that year. Costing $33.5 million to make, it managed to be the most expensive straight to home video film ever released, and the first straight to video movie ever to get nominated for a Razzie.

Cancerous to all it touched, Theodore Rex was director/writer/producer Jonathan R. Betuel’s last ever gig in Hollywood and saw lead actor Whoopi Goldberg sued for $20 million after she tried to escape from the set. Goldberg maintains that Theodore Rex was the only film she ever regretted being in, which really is saying something when she can boast to having such classics as Monkeybone, The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle and Mother Goose: A Rappin’ and Rhymin’ Special on her CV.

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About The Author

Sean is Geek Ireland's resident dinosaur enthusiast, having been fascinated by prehistory since a time before he could read (it's not as long ago as you might think!) - he recently completed a degree in Dinosaur Paleobiology.
In his spare time, Sean writes for Geek Ireland predominantly about science fiction and monster movies. A sucker for a "so bad it's good" creature feature, he can often be found rooting through the bargain bins of DVD shops, looking for 'diamonds in the rough'.